Skip Beat Online
by justdaisy
Summary: Lory trapped Ren and Kyoko in a virtual reality romantic role play game! Their only way out is to embrace their love. The catch? They each think the other is just part of the game.
1. Prologue

**In the short story version of this (found in Skip Beat and I: A Love Story) people seemed to think this would be a MMO game. It can't be though, because Ren and Kyoko both need to think they are the only ones in the game. Almost like Sword Art Online, but not really.**

"This is… a LoveME assignment?" Kyoko asked apprehensively holding a piece of nerve gear and looking at the president.

"Of course. Practicing love in a simulation will be good practice for acting. All the studios are using VRRPGs to train actors."

"VR… pardon?"

"Virtual Reality Role Playing Games. I expect you to write a ten page reflection on your experience when you are done. Now I'll give you some privacy. Put on the nerve gear and lie down on the sofa. Sebastian will act as your body guard while you're… away."

After a moment of imagining what kind of situation she would find herself in Kyoko applied her helmet-like nerve gear. Would she be in a magical realm? Her heart leaped. Would she be in a wartime game? Her stomach flew to her throat. No use delaying the inevitable. She'd be perfectly safe anyway. She lay down and switched the power on.

+++SBO+++

While her body rested on a sofa, Kyoko was at the front gates of LME. In the air in front of her face, a message appeared.

 _Welcome Player! Please enter your name._

A keyboard appeared, and Kyoko typed her name then hit enter.

 _Welcome MOGAMI KYOKO. Your love story begins now._

Love story? A pink envelop appeared on her "screen."

 _Achieve True Love Objective for a reward._

Kyoko hit the "display rewards" box on the image floating before her.

 _Graduate LoveME department_

Well that was incentive. And everything her was fake, and no one was watching her. She could… pretend to fall in love. Trick the system. She was an actor after all.

She entered the building and the entire world froze. A person near her began to glow. Another message appeared.

 _To talk to people, speak to them normally._

Was that necessary? Kyoko wondered as the world went back to normal. Let's see, she thought. I should check the date, who knows what stage of LME this is. Will anyone know me?

She discovered a clue to her situation when she looked down. She was wearing the pink monstrosity.

+++SBO+++

Ren put on his nerve gear reluctantly. The president was holding his next jobs hostage until he played this stupid game.

Not a game. An… acting exercise. Treat it like an acting exercise. You're on the company's dollar, he scolded himself.

When he appeared in front of LME he began to read the instructions found on his virtual screen.

 _Find true love with one of seven potential partners!_

He scrolled through the options and saw his obvious choice. He selected the image.

 _Are you sure?_

He selected OK. The program began loading. An error occurred. He selected retry and waited.

+++SBO+++

Kyoko asked a security guard how to use her screen. She found her menu and read the instructions. She was greatly troubled over the need to select a partner. She decided to put it off. She hit the x in the corner.

 _Error: must select partner before proceeding_.

She was annoyed by this and tried to walk away from the screen but the world was frozen again.

 _Error: must select partner before proceeding._

How annoying! She decided to have a look through her choices. There were several strangers but also her friends Hikaru and Kijima. And Ren. She fretted for several more minutes before reasoning with herself that this was an acting exercise and it was natural for any actor to want to work beside the best actor in Japan. She selected Ren before she could change her mind.

+++SBO+++

Ren's screen finally processed his request.

 _You have selected MOGAMI KYOKO. Step anywhere to continue_.

+++SBO+++

Lory let off a sigh of relief. He had been fairly certain about Ren, but he was not sure who Kyoko would select based off her modesty. Now they were mutual matches and both could proceed. He sat at his desk at the top of the LME building, monitoring his employees' progress on several screens. Both had elevated heart rates but Kyoko also had an increase respiration rate. Lory reasoned the difference was that thin line between excitement and fear. Kyoko seemed to display the latter. He pushed a few buttons and Kyoko was presented with an explanation on Love Meters. Her vital signs increased a bit more. On the video screen Lory could see her blush.

+++SBO+++

Kyoko immediately began to panic over her decision. She was already in love with Ren! Why would she do this to herself? How could she be so disrespectful to her sempai? She was completely objectifying him! The game probably wouldn't even get his personality right. It was superficial and fake and she hated it already. She stomped out the doors… and ran into Ren himself! The one person she was most afraid of seeing.

"Good morning Kyoko," Ren said informally. This was her fault of course, she made the system program him like that. Her response compensated for her previous inappropriate behaviour.

+++SBO+++

"Good morning, Ren-sama."

Ren cringed. Damn! This game must be on the highest difficulty setting!

"What's wrong?" The concerned character of Kyoko asked.

"Let's get to work!" He changed the subject. The world around him froze. The character of Yashiro appeared, and rotated just off the ground in front of Ren. Text appeared.

 _This is YASHIRO. He provides you with your missions. Meet him in YOUR OFFICE._

A map of the building appeared. A room flashed red. Ren assumed this was his office. He was still staring at the map when the world returned to normal.

+++SBO+++

"Tsuruga-san?" Ren had suddenly changed expressions. Then his gentleman smile returned. A glitch in the system? Kyoko had never played a video game herself, especially a virtual reality game. Sho was bad at them and broke the console when they were little and that was that.

"Excuse me Mogami-san, I must go to my office. Hopefully I see you later," he finished with a smile and a bow. As he walked away Kyoko let herself blush. The stupid game made "Ren" hope to see her later!

Her world suddenly froze and a map appeared.

 _Go to LOVEMe HQ for a mission_

Finally! Something work-oriented. This love stuff was wearing her out.

 **There was a lot of perspective jumping in this chapter. Did anyone struggle? Please let me know.**


	2. Level 1 A

Since when was filing part of a video game? Mogami sat sorting papers alphabetically. The job was unexpectedly interesting. Amongst the hydro and cleaning payment records were the invoices for Lory's shenanigans. Things like "camel" and "marching band" popped up regularly so the time in the filing room was passing quickly.

Yashiro informed Ren he was to meet the president in room M364. That wasn't a real room in LME but the layout of the videogame made it simple enough to find. When he entered, the door slammed behind him. He jiggled the lock. He was locked in! Ok, it was just a game. No need to panic. He decided to check out his environment. It was a filing room, with a little break room attached. _Meeting my ass_ Ren thought to himself as he tried to understand why the game wanted him here. He started checking drawers but the papers were all blank; unnecessary details to the game. Frustrated he slammed a drawer shut.

Mogami heard a noise. It had startled her! She tentatively called out.

"Hello? Is someone there?"

 _That fucking president_ , Ren thought, cluing into the situation. Tempted as he was to let this play out as the porno that likely inspired the situation, Ren rightfully decided to play it safe. Her character was, after all, on its highest difficulty level.

"Mogami-san, is that you?"

Was that Tsuruga-san? What was he doing here? She purposefully gathered her stack of A-C papers and walked out of the break room, looking busy.

"Oh, hello Tsuruga-san," she said casually. She slipped a highlighter behind her ear. It promptly fell and she reflexively reached for it. The invoices flew everywhere. Talk about embarrassing. At least this wasn't real life. She bent to gather the papers as quickly as possible, head down to disguise her blushing. Her hand reached out and connected with something warm. She looked up, right into Ren's eyes. She had grabbed his hand. Her mouth opened and closed a few times before she snapped back to reality. Like, the virtual kind.

Ren stared down into Mogami's eyes. Her mouth distracted him. She wasn't running away which was good. He started leaning in… nope. He spoke to soon. She snapped her hand back to her side.

"Thank you," she mumbled, no longer looking at him. "Well! I'd best get back to work." She moved two feet to the left of where they were standing and opened a cabinet. The papers were out of order but this was a video game so screw it. She put the A's in the A's and the B's in the B's but didn't bother sorting it further.

 _A programing flaw_ , Ren noted. He opened a cabinet to look busy. The drawer was full of blank paper. Was he an actor or was he an actor? He looked at it a sheet purposefully and prepared to make his exit "attempt." [VL1]

"Mogami-san, do you have a key for this room?"

"No, why?"

"I believe we are locked in."

That couldn't be true! This stupid game! She tried the door. He was right. Oh dear. Her virtual little heart began to virtually race. She was in a filing room with the character she had selected as a love partner. This was dangerous! What would he do? No.

"Why don't you call sanitation to come unlock the door? I need to continue my filing." She still had 23 letters to kill time with.

Lory couldn't believe what he was watching. He logged out and went to his computer. He pressed a few buttons and a thirty second countdown began. He grabbed a snack from the fridge and settled in front of the screen to see what they would do.

 **Help! I'm looking for shoujo cliches Lory would likely program into a love video game. Please comment!**


End file.
